Wednesday, May 11, 2005

Well I'm not much of a film buff but apparently we're off to see The Revenge of the Sith with the guys at work soon. Piccies here on the BBC. Now like most people I love the original three (although I think there should be more female Jedis) and am Lucas-warm about the new three. And here's the thing. The new three lack one key element that the old three have - Hans Solo! Or a character like him. A character who doesn't take himself too seriously and laughs at the way the others do. A character who is motivated by self-interest rather than grandiose ideals. A character we can genuinely identify with. And Hans makes the ludicrous parts seem all the more believable because he's sat in the middle of it going "I can't believe this either".

Without him it ends up feeling more like a third rate version of Lord-of-the-Rings. Well hopefully this next one will be better. Seems like everyone out there agrees the new three aren't as good as the old three but no-one can indentify why. Well problem solved folks. Also there should be more women in it with interesting roles (but that's true of every show on TV more or less).

4 comments:

Why should there be more women in interesting roles, or more women 'Jedi', whatever they are? Mr Lucas has hit on a winning formula, which brings in millions, if not billions of dollars. Why should he bother to tweak the product? He's not in the business of producing sex equality information films, he's into making Hollywood blockbusters for money. I'm not pro-Lucas, I've never seen any Star Wars film.

The easiest way for me to make money is by mugging old ladies. I choose to make a living by (arguably) more moral means. The arguement that we should all just do whatever makes us the richest the quickest would rapidly lead to a society that you didn't want to live in very much. Instead we balance what's best for us with what is best for society. Promoting sexual stereotypes is not good for society in general.

I'd be quite happy seeing more female Jedi- there's one who gets gunned down in Episode III but she's only a very minor character. There's a pretty cool female Sith in the cartoon series that showed on the American channel "Cartoon Network" but I dunno if you'd have been able to see it in the UK.

And, from someone born in 1976, who grew up with the original trilogy, I have to correct you on one of my favorite characters of all time: it's Han Solo. Only one S in the whole thing. :-)